Where does the gold go?

[ciaran00]

Doesn't the money go to the infamous trade federation (the only sort of shady dealers who would be able to provide said enchanter with the rare raw materials he needs), with roots in demonic bloodlines, who would invest the petty cash into
A) fueling elaborate transformation rituals conducted by the hermetic members of its upper echelons
B) saturating magic-deprived markets with their own stock, dominating certain local economies for a short time before legal interdicts drive them out
C) paying assassins who would target any important faces of an opposing infamous trade federation
D) conducting research into the burial site/last epic stand of an ancient evil that could be resurrected and extorted
E) financing a reputed catering team to supply their secretly-observed cultist rites with sandwiches and cakes

That sounds right, doesn't it?

ciaran

 

[rijeagle]

I assume the money goes toward buying magical reagents and components. Newbie adventurers are always being sent on quests by powerful wizards-- you know, "I'll pay you 5000 gp to fetch me the left eye of an albino black dragon hatchling"? This time you're on the paying end, not the dragon-slaying end.

Without getting into the intracacies of realities TOO much, the idea above is very close to how it would be done. Let's use a simplistic example for arguments sake:

A wizard needs a 10,000 gold diamond for a certain magical item. First why is it worth 10,000? Yes diamonds are valuable, but not in and of themselves.

So let's follow the steps of this one diamond, and how it came to be worth 10000gp.

The mining company digs up the rough diamond material. As diamonds are difficult to find, it takes a long period of time in between each find. In the meantime the company needs to pay it's workers, buy equipment, pay engineers, probably clerics and wizards for spells and healing of injured workers, pay Warriors for protection from unknown dangers, etc, etc. So it's cost of finding that one diamond is probably around 2000gp.They charge the caravan who delivers the rough materials to town 3,000 for a 1000 profit.

The caravan needs to pay it's people, warriors for protection, possible a wizard or cleric, feed to horses, maintain the wagons, and pay possible border taxes. Alone these expenses could run to over 1000 gp a month. If the mine is far, then it will be very expensive. So let's say 1000gp is for expenses. The caravan will charge 5000gp to the jewelrer.

The jewelrer needs expensive tools, an excellent workshop with special lighting, maybe pay some goons for protection, possibly a wizard or cleric too and he might have an assistant or two, doing the day to day mundania of the shop. And the time spent working on that one diamond for say, two days. The jewelrer charges the merchant 7000gp, to cover his expenses, and make a tidy profit.

The merchant, he has a shop to run, or a wagon to haul, so he has expenses, maybe a bodyguard or two, probably expensive tastes, and runs a high markup due to the fine items he sells, so he charges 10,000gp to the wizard.

Thus the 10000 diamond. Not one person is getting that gold. By the time it is said and done, several dozen or a couple hundred people got a piece of that 10,000. The economy would not be overwhelmed, as the money is spread out all over the place.

The only problem is that the D&D money system is extremely out of realistic boundaries, due to the nature of the game. If every game ever played on one world, with all of it's treasures, weapons, magic, etc. etc. etc. were to be piled up, it would be insanely huge. probably in the trillions of gold pieces. The whole idea of the high value of everything seems to throw the money side out of wack.

The game is based upon the fact that the pc's will inherently come across vast amounts of money, or the game could not continue, for no one could afford to keep up with the game's expansiveness in level gains, and more powerful creatures, etc. And it is fantasy. If prices for some of the mundane items in the PHB were price like that in the historical medieval period, people would have starved. The average peasant may have seen( in game terms) probably 2-5 silver pieces a month. Hardly enough to eat on. A gold piece would be a treasure to these people.

Anyway, rest assured, the economy of any given world would never be destroyed by one adventuring party due to the vast amount of money they may spend, because that same vast amount of money was spent to get it into the adventurers hands, and everyone involved got a piece of the pie.

To put it into perspective, the United States has a GDP of roughly 24 trillion dollars. That means that 24 trillion dollars exchanged hands in 1 year in goods and services in the United States alone. In no way does that amount of value ruin the economy, it keeps it going, because everyone gets a piece of it. I won't get into the class warfare part of it, we all know how that its...

 

[Altalazar]

Class warfare - you mean like Wizards versus Fighters? Nevermind...

But Class Warfare is an interesting point to consider - things were rather lopsided historically in terms of wealth distribution - perhaps as bad as it is in the US today, likely much much worse. So the question as to where the money goes, almost all of it goes into the hands of a very few, powerful people.

I do still think the prices of magic items are somewhat out of whack - but then the prices in the PHB are also vastly inflated compared to historical prices. I almost think that the magic item prices only make sense in an extremely low magic world - then if you have a realistic money system, almost nobody can afford to buy even a single magic item, even the very rich. That makes a certain degree of sense.

Then the cost of making an item is just another factor in the item's rarity. That would also mean that you wouldn't necessarily have characters getting oodles of cash. There is something to be said for having less money but making it worth more in a campaign.

 

[Li Shenron]

Can't we just say that the equivalent of that value was gathered by the Wizards itself during previous adventuring, he doesn't buy all the materials when crafting the item, just a few missing ingredients perhaps and the rest was bought or collected previously and stored in the mage's alcove.

I have the same hard time imagining a Wiz keeping 60.000gp under his matrass (sp?) than I have imagining him overload by money going to the local store.

Just assume that the Wiz got his share of treasure in form of weird and precious materials (or simply bought them later in adventures downtime).

Frankly, I never bother with keeping track of exact treasure found by PCs (except magic items of course)... who really have them come out of the dungeon with golder chandeliers, precious paintings and thousands of silver and copper coins (which I guess should be much more common than gold ones)?

Of course an occasional quest for the rarest ingredient could provide a lot of fun, but I have a hard time believing that many DMs require to keep track of such a burden... at least at the rate of which standard D&D campaigns see the PCs craft many magic items. If instead that's very rare IYC then it could be feasible.

 

[CRGreathouse]

I always found it funny that the comment "worth it's weight in gold," is an expression meaning absurdly high value in the real world. In D&D, such a saying would probably mean something like "reasonably priced." A belt pouch is one gp. An empty chest (no lock) is 2 gp. So is a barrel and a backpack. Ink is worth *far* more than it's weight in gold 1 oz per 8 gp. A halfling's climbers kit costs 80 gp and weighs less than 4 pounds.

Nah. The empty chest is worth less than its weight in copper. Barrels are worth less than chests by the pound. A belt pouch isn't worth its weight in silver, let alone gold. Backpacks are worth 1/5 their weight in silver.

The ink, at just over twice its weight in gold, is as valuable as you claim (for no reason I can see).

 

[Nifft]

There is an invisible line IMC above which you just can't buy things -- you need to barter, steal, kill, or take Craft Feats to get them. It's probably going to be around the cost of a +5 weapon. Below that, things are available for sale in large cities.

-- N

 

[Norfleet]

Yes, but having an "invisible line" makes little or no sense, other than as an appeasement to the Game Balance Gods again. Clearly, if such an item exists, or can be made, somebody will be willing to make them, or they wouldn't have existed at all. Unless, of course, you accept that all game currency will be worthless, and items of such power are not sold to the hoi polloi for mere gold pieces, but instead are auctioned off on eBay for real cash.